Arizona foreclosure sales up in third quarter

Foreclosure sales in Arizona accounted for about a third of all home purchases in the state during the third quarter, according to a report released Thursday by RealtyTrac.

"Arizona had the third highest percentage of all sales that were foreclosure sales," said Daren Blomquist, Vice President of RealtyTrac. "Georgia was at number one, California was at number two."

Thirty-four percent of all residential sales were from foreclosed properties. Blomquist said it's taking a long time for the market to absorb all of the homes that went into foreclosure during the housing crisis.

"Especially in Phoenix where we've seen the high foreclosure numbers for a long time now, it seems like, ‘Can't we be done with this already?'"

One bright spot in RealtyTrac's report is the average price of a foreclosed property in Arizona is up 17 percent year-over-year.

"That number is the highest increase in the average foreclosure price of any state in the nation," Blomquist said. "So even with these foreclosure sales happening, the market there is absorbing them pretty efficiently and there's enough demand that the prices are actually going up."

Nationwide, foreclosure sales increased 21 percent in the third quarter.